Trials
by she-never-missed
Summary: Rose Weasley is a good girl, so why was she in a trial for Improper Use of Magic? Why because of Scorpius Malfoy of course. And to get out of this trial, she needs to stop lying, not to the judge, but to herself.


**Hey guys, so I don't know if y'all are tired of all the Scorose fics I've been doing, but I love these two to bits, so more Scorose it is. This was written for the Quidditch League Fanfiction Competition with the prompt of writing about the Improper Use of Magic department of the Ministry. The additional prompts I used were the words 'ghost' and 'range' and the quote "I lie to myself all the time. But I never believe me." I hope you guys like it.**

**Trials**

_"I lie to myself all the time. But I never believe me." S.E. Hinton, The Outsiders_

Rose Weasley was a good girl. She was a good student, she was a good friend, she was a good _person. _She would never skipped class, or back-stabbed anyone, and she would _never _do anything worth needing a trial - right? But if that was the case, why was Rose Weasley seated in her own trial for Improper Use of Magic? Well the answer was obvious, of course. His name was Scorpius Malfoy.

Scorpius Malfoy was a good boy- some of the time at least. He was a good student when he applied himself, which he rarely did. He was a good friend, as long as his 'friends' kept giving him what he wanted. He was a good person- sort of. He only skipped class on occasion, his backstabbing was at a record low this year, and of course he'd never break the law- or at least, he'd never get caught for it. So of course, the trial he was seated in at the moment wasn't his, and it wasn't his fault either. It was hers. So he said.

"Rose Weasley, please present your side of the story," said a woman on the other side of the room, and Rose stood, hands shaking slightly.

She ran over the facts in her head. Surely she wouldn't be tried guilty. Surely she'd get out of this. She took a deep breath. "It started a week ago.

"I was walking home from one of my muggle friends' house, and I got the feeling someone was following me. It was late, almost midnight, and I was the only one on the street. I was nervous, naturally. I'm only sixteen, and I'm planning on living a little longer. I was trying to figure out if whoever it was was in range for me to shoot with a disarming curse if it came down to it. I thought about bringing out my wand then and there, at least to give me some light, and I figured that I could tell a muggle that it was a flashlight if it came down to it."

The people in the courtroom starting talking among themselves at this, most likely because half of them didn't know what a flashlight was. After a few moments, a bushy brown haired woman rolled her eyes and raised her voice from the defendants area, "It's a muggle handheld light," she said, "Literally a light that flashes."

Rose pushed back a smirk as she watched her father whisper something in the other woman's ear, who in turn let out an exasperated sigh.

"So I decided against it," Rose said, "I figured that it wasn't worth a trial. That obviously worked out splendidly." She paused as some spectators laughed and others narrowed their eyes at her. She pressed on.

"I figured I could make it home. I only lived two blocks away. It wouldn't take me too long. But I kept feeling like I was being watched. I tried convincing myself it was the wind, but the wind doesn't step on twigs by accident or shuffle their feet just the slightest bit, the wind doesn't _breathe._ But I kept looking behind me, and there was no one there. It was like getting stalked by a ghost."

More muttering broke out, and Rose cursed under her breath, "Muggle ghost, not wizard ghost. They're different. You know, like spirits that you can't see? They float around and haunt people sometimes?" She was met with blank stares. "Never mind.

"So anyways, I made it home, and I just went straight to my room and shut the blinds on the windows. I still felt uneasy, but I tried to go to sleep.

"The next morning, I had to bike to a local convenience store to buy some milk. We'd run out and Dad needed his coffee. But while I was in the store, something felt off again. Boxes of things shifted slightly when I looked in their direction, as if concealing someone behind them. There was a cold feeling in the air.

"I was on my way home when I saw him. I pulled the brakes of my bike, and turned around, just to see him slip behind a bush. But there was nowhere for him to run then, so he was still there when I got off my bike and walked over to him. It was startling how much he did look like a ghost; paper white skin, hair so blonde it was practically silver, and pale grey eyes to top it all off." Rose looked sideways at the boy in question. He winked.

Rose snorted and muttered something that sounded vaguely like '_idiot' _under her breath. "I asked him what he was doing, and he bluntly said, and I quote: 'Following you.' There wasn't even any pretending that he wasn't stalking me.

"He said, 'A pretty girl like you shouldn't be out all alone. You never know what kind of creeps you'll attract, I'm here to watch out for you.' I didn't mention that he was actually one of those creeps. It seemed quite obvious." She chose not to mention how butterflies leapt in her stomach at the compliment, and how sincere his normally cold eyes looked. She also chose not to mention that she had smiled and said '_Thanks, I guess.'_

"You forgot to say that you secretly enjoyed that I thought you were pretty, because you've secretly liked me since fourth year," supplied Scorpius from off to the side.

Well there was that. But rather than admitting that to anyone, even herself, she scoffed. "Stalkers aren't my type, Malfoy," she said, and got on with her story.

"He wouldn't even let me ride home alone after that," Rose said, "He held on to one of my handlebars so I had to go at his pace, and tried to walk me back to my house. And the key word there is 'tried'. Mr. Malfoy, despite his obvious knack for scoping people out in their towns, failed to scope out my town well enough to know that when the sidewalk turns, you must turn with it. The alternative, as we both found out very soon after, was tumbling down a dirt hill that lasts for about four and a half meters before giving way to a cliff- which we fell off. If I had not used the _Arresto Momentum_ charm to slow us down, the two of us would have been grease spots on the road below us.

"Is this true, Mr. Malfoy?" the judge asked, and Scorpius shrugged.

"For the most part. She left out that the reason we fell wasn't directly my fault. She was too busy staring into my eyes to notice that she was rolling off the path."

The judge sighed, "This is neither the time nor place for these issues of yours, Mr. Malfoy. Whether or not you were staring into each other's eyes is purely between Miss. Weasley and yourself. Is it true that if Miss. Weasley did not use magic, you would not be alive?"

"Yes," he said, and Rose, although bright red from the judge's earlier comment, sighed in relief.

"Very well," the judge said, "We will discuss this. Please wait for our verdict."

As they talked, Scorpius sauntered over to her. "We both know you were staring at me," he said in a low voice, and Rose blushed even deeper.

"I was doing no such thing," she lied. She hadn't been _staring, _per se, she was just looking at them. She was just wondering how such a cool, steely grey could look so warm and inviting as well. Surely his eyes hadn't looked like that before. Maybe- Rose stopped herself. This was no good.

"Of course not," he whispered, "But you can stop lying to yourself, Rosie. Even you don't believe it anymore, do you?"

Rose bit her lip, and for the first time in her life, she didn't have an answer.


End file.
